


An Introduction to Favoritism

by periru3



Category: Community
Genre: Best Friends, Love Confessions, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-29
Updated: 2012-03-29
Packaged: 2017-11-02 16:18:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/370946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/periru3/pseuds/periru3
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Troy/Abed, just after "Contemporary Impressionists." Troy can't stop thinking about their fight, and Abed notices.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Introduction to Favoritism

After Abed got out of the Dreamatorium, the rest of the evening was pretty typical. When Abed stepped into the blanket fort, he acknowledged Troy—by now immersed in Pokémon Soul Silver—with a glance and slid silently into bed where he promptly opened his laptop and commenced with screenplay writing. The quiet, punctuated only by the clicking of keys and buttons and the occasional rustling of sheets, was familiar and soothing.  
Eventually, as usual, Troy decided that it was time for bed, and tucked his DS off to the side as Abed, night owl as he was, continued clicking away at his keys. He lay there for a few minutes, waiting for sleep to come, but instead, all he got were thoughts. Thoughts about Abed. Thoughts he had been specifically avoiding with video games for most of the evening. Having already decided that it was far too late for those, Troy resorted to counting sheep. After glancing around the room for a few minutes and counting only two—one on the box of Babe and one in the picture of him and Abed at a petting zoo—he felt no closer to sleep than he had before. After grumpily wondering why that was even a thing people did and if he just had an abnormally small number sheep in his bedroom, Troy gave in to his brain, and commenced with thinking.

“You’re still upset,” observed Abed after about half an hour, mechanically and simply as if they had just been talking mere seconds ago.

“I—how did you know I was awake?”

“You move around when you’re awake. You move around even more when you’re asleep,” Abed stated, now pausing in his rhythmic typing. “You’re only ever still when you want me to think you’re asleep, but are actually awake.”

Troy was struck, not for the first time, by how observant Abed was. People called it creepy. Sometimes Troy hated People.

“You’re still upset,” Abed repeated, this time with a hint of concern and something that might’ve been confusion peaking through.

“Not at you,” answered Troy after some consideration.

“Troy?”

“Hm?”

“Friends still don’t lie, right?…”

Troy sighed. “Yeah, Abed… friends don’t lie. I’m sorry. But I mean it, I’m not upset at you.”

“Then what are you upset about?”

Troy realized that even after the unusually large amount of thinking he’d engaged in that night, he still didn’t have a good answer. He tried his best to form one on the spot.

“I don’t want… you to think you have to… do what I tell you,” ventured Troy hesitantly. Abed was silent, waiting for Troy to clarify. In his mind, Troy had just contradicted what he had said earlier, and with anyone else, he would’ve pointed that out instantly. With Troy, he knew it would become clear if he gave Troy time. Sometimes Time was all Troy needed.

“At least not when you say it like that… I said I wanted you to trust me, not take orders from me. I’m just… I just worried about you, is all. And I don’t want to tell you what to do, I just want to keep you safe… Cause you’re like… my favorite person ever, okay?”

There was no one else in the world Troy could say that to, and not just because it wasn’t true of anyone else, but because no one else would nod and understand the depth behind the awkwardly phrased statement. As he said it, he suddenly felt the urge to say it again, but better.

“I love you.”

Silence. And then, “If I say I love you back, do we have to have a dramatic coming-out plotline?”

“No.”

“Good. In the past few years some shows like Glee have done them to death, and they have a dangerous tendency to come off as preachy. Also, I don’t think the high-drama scenario would fit in well in our current sit-com genre.” Abed was silent again for a moment. “I love you too.”

Troy let out a sigh of relief, even though Abed had obviously been getting to that part.

“Can we have our first kiss tomorrow? It’s just, bunk beds aren’t really a good setting for such a dramatically crucial scene, and I’m kind of wrapped up in my laptop chord…”

Troy laughed a little, not least of all because Abed’s voice suddenly sounded almost shy. “Sure.”

Abed’s turn to let out a sigh of relief.

“Cool. Cool cool cool. Night.”

“Night, Abed.”

 


End file.
